I wonder why. I bet it had nothing to do with how bad the game turned out.

I've already tried to turn in my copy to 6 different game stops, no ones taking them because of the amount of people that returned this PoS game.

I did some checking on this claim since I've seen it elsewhere and it is factually not true.

The reason Game Stop is not accepting returns is because ATVI convinced retailers to take too many copies of the game for current gen consoles. Even Battlefield has experienced a serious lull in sales. This lull is nearly identical to the drop in game sales prior to the release of current gen consoles many years ago.

The minimum wage guy at your local Game Stop may have told you something different, but that's not what the real story is.

BTW - 98k people online at any given moment is not reflective of how many people play the game each day. Supposing that 98k figure holds steady for 24 hours, and assuming people play an average of 2 hours at a time, the 98k figure indicates between 1 million and 1.2 million people are playing the game each day on average. Not bad. Not bad at all.

Agreed. However the point remains. Less people are playing, and continuing to play than ever before. With the increase and expansion of the community in recent years, it does say something. Is it that the game sucks, or has widened the skill gap? Maybe a little of both? Disclaimer- I don't think the game sucks, just think that it needs some attention in certain areas, and understand how it has turned many people off, probably those who either don't have the patience or want/skill to adapt. I think a majority of those people, who also make up huge numbers of those discussed, fall in that range of people affected by increasing that skill gap.

not even 100,000 people online a week after release.says it all really.

Doesn't really say anything because, for starters, are you looking at the number at the moment or the number throughout the day? Also, are you looking at the numbers showing on your platform? Remember, there are several other platforms out there, as well.

You're also not calculating that a lot of people are waiting for the nextgen consoles to drop before making their purchases.

Regarding sound whoring, I've been a sound whore since MW1. It's never been as big of an issue as it was in Ghosts. I don't know why that is because, frankly, I've never needed the perks that amplify foot steps to know when I've got someone on my six. In fact, I've ticked off a lot of people that were using Dead Silence because players make a really bad assumption about the perk. Secret: Dead Silence has NEVER been 100% dead silent. If your character hugs a wall while moving, if your character walks through grass?? Your character makes a very faint sound. With training (I would go to private match to get good at recognizing it), you do not need perks that amplify opponent sounds.

Have you looked at next gen copy sales. sure more people will buy it the closer it gets. I dont think they add up though. As previously said, looking at the number on at any given time is not a great representation of total figures playing the game, but it has gone down. Atleast with the increase in the community recently, the wild increase has slowed, almost to a stop.

SrgntMerkWorthy ... Not really sure what your interpretation is saying. Total population has always tended to decline between release and Christmas. For a few weeks it will go up again then steadily decline.

I didn't buy MW1 at release so I didn't pay attention to how many copies were still on the shelf between release and Christmas. But for Ghosts, I did post that it was disheartening to see so many copies still on the shelves. Then came the claims that Game Stop was not accepting returns or doing buy-backs. You can do a quick Google search and find out the real reason for this - and it is not what store employees have told a few people.

As others have noted, the reduced sales numbers are producer-wide. Battlefield and other games that have been recently release have all seen a decline in final point sales. Every developer is reporting the decline is similar to the decline witnessed when the current generation consoles were about to be released.

There is another factor that has not yet been mentioned. Because there are still many thousands of players playing previous titles, you're not going to see the total number of people playing Call of Duty while you have a particular game in your console. With so many versions of the game still being played, that eats into the total number that are going to be playing the most recent release.

I think what will define Call of Duty: Ghosts will be total sales over the year. I'll give you a reason why: even if I like the game when I play it, I'm not sure I'm going to buy it. I'm only going to get 2 years max out of it on the current gen consoles? That's not appealing to me. I have challenges not yet completed on other titles and waiting a while to buy another COD game and another console would give me the time to finish getting my money's worth out of the previous titles.

Soundwhoring isnt the only reason they spotted you. Not everyone out there uses a headset. If you want to quit because you legitimately got killed then fine. But stop trying to pretend that everyone out their is overpowered because they use a headset.

And to narrow it down even further not every player out there uses amplify.

I have no intention of quitting this game I will get my moneys worth. Now I never said everybody who's ever killed was soundwhoring. Now I did say it was OP and I stand by that. IW seems to make games that cater to camping soundwhores.

Hey, I'm with you - sitting in a room listening for someone to run up like a headless chicken is not my cup of tea ... well, it isn't most of the time.

But you make an assumption if you think I meant that players can sit in one place and hear someone flanking them. You're assuming that I was camping in order to pull it off. That never ticks someone off. They figure you just happened to check your six.

No, what pizzes people off is when you're making your way around the map and they've spotted you. They think, "Oh, here's an idiot I can run up and either pop in the head with an execution kill or knife." They think I'm an idiot because I'm not hugging the wall. Well, you dumb ox, I'm not hugging the wall because YOUR CHARACTER MAKES SOUND when you hug the wall. If I'm not hugging the wall but I hear a wall hugging sound, what's the logical conclusion??

Someone behind me is hugging the wall!

So, with my super-high sensitivity, I do a 180 right there on the spot and open fire, killing the opponent in a speed and fashion that comes across as inexplicable. And then they rage that I'm using an aimbot or that i've hacked the game or some other idiot rant.

No, I just look for the nuances of the game that will help me out. Too many of you guys focus on the arcade aspects of the game. This is not a strict arcade shooter. There are non-arcade features that can help you. Will sound whoring alone let you run up a 30 kill streak? No.

But there are 100s, if not 1000s, of little tiny things you can do that set the stage for the next engagement.

For example, getting a feel for how fast your weapon goes through ammo. As a result, you may be able to take on 4 opponents. But the first two took a little more ammo than it felt like was average. In that case, most players keep on engaging the remaining two opponents with the idea of, "Well, at least I'll go down in a blaze of glory."

I don't do that. I egress and reload. It doesn't matter if those other two "easy" kills get away because even if I don't kill them, they will respawn and I can engage them again later.

This game is not about getting kills. It's about staying alive. If you can stay alive, you will get the kills.

You hug walls so you can sneak up for a kill. I stay away from walls so I can stay alive. Minor difference in investment, but a huge difference in R.O.I.

I hardly ever use it. Unless I am playing search, being really sneaky and relying on sound to find people, it generally does not fit my play style. Does it work incredibly, YES. If people are that worried about it, use Dead Silence. It doesn't completely silence you, but makes it much harder to hear in a directional way.

Another classic thread complaining about a perk when they refuse to help themselves because they expect the developer to do everything for them.

IW has taken the COD series back to the drawing board and now wants people to play more tactfully. What does that mean? That means, whatever playstyle you used to use, might not work now or might not work as effectively as it used to. You need to learn and change your playstyle according to the new layouts of the game.

I for one havent even unlocked Amplify yet but since I have a TB X42 headset, I dont even see the point in using the perk since all I have to do is turn up the volume high enough because without that I can still hear people moving around.

Every COD veteran here knows that not every game will be the same. There will be slight changes that makes us change the way we play but only a little bit. Its people who got used to the hand holding crap of the post-MW2 era that refuses to do anything for themselves.

You need to start playing more conservatively. Dont just run around everywhere. IW did away with running around with no consequence. You need to start understanding how people play and where they like to go to on the map. You need to start crouch walking to avoid those with headsets and Amplify. Is this a fool proof tactic? No, but it sure will help a good half of the time when you play.

You only do that when you're right outside the room where SitRep shows enemy equipment. Approach the room like normal then, right before entering the room, crouch walk around to a different access and kill the camper from behind.

Other than that, even people that were "sound whoring" rarely pay attention to the sounds.

Who said anything about crouch walking around the entire map? Anyone with common sense would know that it takes too long to do that so, as common sense dictates, you should crouch walk around the areas that people are known for going to. Wouldnt you rather crouch walk and avoid those with Amplify and TBs than run in full force everywhere and getting yourself killed more than half of the time due to your own stupidity? I would have thought that would have been a simple yes, but you are too stubborn for that aren't you? You expect the developer to do everything for you and hold your hand the whole time. You need to grow up and understand that the developer wont change every little thing just because it provides a challenge for you that can easily be avoided most of the time by helping yourself.

Crouch walking is not essential. But it does help a lot. It goes back to what I said about having to change our playstyle just a little bit. But if you are giving this much of a fuss about it, that tells me you refuse to change just a tiny bit to fit in with the new ways of the game. If every COD were the same year after year because of people constantly complaining about things that they themselves can avoid, then hardly anyone would be playing and this series would have stopped years ago and all that would have been released is map packs.

You cant always rely on what you used to do. I have played this series since COD4. Do you think I have played every COD the same way over the past 6 years without changing anything in my playstyle? Hell no. Because I am a COD veteran and I KNOW that in order to play in this series you HAVE to change your playstyle just a little if you want to keep playing.

The developers are not going to always hold your hand anymore. The training wheels are coming off, it is up to YOU to keep the bike balanced as you ride it.

My comment WAS directed toward you. Who else would i be saying that too? And i didnt insult you. The part about stupidity is how i view the constant running into things you can avoid.

Since you only commented back with that i am only assuming you have nothing to say in response to common sense that 3 people here have already presented. This is common with people who just complain without anything more than frustration of always getting beat by something they can avoid.

If there wasn't a counter to "Dead Silence" (I think they should have renamed it to Lightweight or something) then it will have been more expensive, especially as you no longer sacrifice unlimited sprint for the privilege. People hated on MLC in MW2 and having fast players silent will aggravate that. You were better off using Ninja than Commando in MW2 but whatever. I mean it will be better than Incog and that costs 3 points as it is.

But then make Dead Silence so that you can't hear anything else as if you're playing with no sound on your TV etc. That way you can't soundwhore other people by silencing your own footsteps and then it will be truely a stealth option.

adapt, if you dont wanna use DS then you are gonna get sound whored, I dont wanna use DS, but i recognize that people are listening for movement, so i use it and amplify

DS shouldn't be completely silent, and it basically is for players not using amplify, if they are using it, then they are spending a perk to use it, where they could be using something else.. it is alot easier to hear in this game oppose to Bo2, being I used awareness on every class in bo2, and i could still hear DS players in that as well.. it was hard to, but u could

however i do want them to nerf it and lower the ability, because less people will use it , while Ill still use it and get a bigger jump on people like i did in bo2

First off I'm a sound whore. I haven't played without headphones for over 5 years and continue to upgrade them.

I'm happy the sound is more like it used to be. BO2 had been a very big change with sound, but I adapted and got used to it after time, no complaints. Now we need to adapt again. Guess why? Its a new game.

This change is another perfect example of how CoD is not a progression, title to title searching for the perfect game. Each is completely different and needs to be respected as a stand alone title. The developers have their own ideas and preferences.

In my warped view for a lone time, I didn't understand why every title was moving more and more away from CoD4. It wasn't until I had to dig very deep in BO2 to realize the problem wasn't the developers or the game, but instead my perspective.

This post is actually kinda funny. "I can't hear them, so they're jerks." "They can overly hear me, so they're jerks." Come on. I use a class regularly dubbed "ghost". The entire stealth category of perks, and a loaded honey badger. If you're going to complain about two perks that are some of the least used perks now. I just find it funny, of all the bugs and physics that are wrong here, you go on about two small perks. Advice: use awareness to hear silence, or just deal with it. At least you did not give the "I'm never playing this again until…" speal.

No need to soundwhore and use amplify.. Lol. It's loud enough without it. I use a headset and HATE the fact that things are as loud as they are. I can't wait to unlock Dead Silence. (I don't want to use squad points and I am a slow leveler.) I confuse teammates movements for the enemy and vice versa. Sucks when playing HC because I turn when I hear something (which turns out to be a teammate) and then get shot in the back from the enemy. Pretty sure they will tweak it a bit eventually...I hope anyway.

As I'm typing this I'm sitting in my office 3 rooms away from my back-side door. There is a television <ON> in between. If someone walks up my back-side door deck I can hear them loud as day. This is called REALISM.

Ears hear sound, men in military boots running on any surface will make sound. They aren't wearing Gong-Fu slippers walking on silk roads. Ears hear sound and sound is meant to be heard.

Sorry little baby didn't get 2 prizes in his happy meal today. Quit complaining you can't run around corners with reckless abandon and not be heard, what you want is fake.

Alright, I do not want to come in here and start a big argument, but i really do not like it when people complain about amplify or use the word soundwhoring. They made it to where you could hear peoples foot steps for a reason and it just ads to the skill of the player. It is good and does not make you a noob. Also, I think in the last update they made it almost impossible to hear people with dead silence, so just put that on and you should be fine.

As I re-read my last post it appeared to me as if I was complaining about the volume of the footsteps. That was not my intention. I was just trying to state that yes they are a bit loud, but there are things to counter it. If they tweak it, they tweak it...if they don't, then they don't. Won't bother one way or another...SO...Either way, I will still choose to run dead silence, because very few players will actually be running amplify anyway.

Not that I care one way or another about the headset issue, but I will say that, given the volume of conversations in the forums in which players mention using headsets from brands other than TB, I don't think any relationship between TB and IW has anything to do with it.

Furthermore, the headset complaint is a non sequitor - the game is built to support use of headsets and surround sound systems. In fact, the only thing "unusual" in the soundwhoring debate are players who use neither headsets nor surround sound systems.